Editor: Janine Hansen
In the Year of Our Lord
Vol. 34 No. 5
Thanks to all of your E-mails and calls our efforts at the Legislature were very successful! The Regular Session ends June 4th.
AB383 is a wonderful surprise, which passed the Assembly 42-0 and the Senate 21-0. The original bill only covered the availability of a Nevada link to the Social Security Administration where an employer could verify the SS#’s of his employees. (Asm. Kirkpatrick was the sponsor). This is a great bill and long overdue! Amazingly, it was amended in the Assembly to include the following:
Passed Assembly 42-0 Senate 21-0 and signed by Governor!
Perhaps the most important bill this session, AB95 was born of the gun confiscations from law-abiding citizens in the Katrina aftermath. This bill prohibits the Governor or head of a county or city to authorize the confiscation of or to actually confiscate firearms and ammunition during an emergency. It sites in the bill the Second Amendment in the US Constitution and Sec. 11 of Article 1 of the Nevada Constitution which states, “Every citizen has the right to keep and bear arms for security and defense, for lawful hunting and recreational use and for other lawful purposes.” Asm. Valerie Weber was the sponsor.
SB237: Reciprocity for Concealed Carry Weapons Permits--Passes!
Passed Senate 20-1, Amended & passed Assembly 41-0, waiting final Senate approval.
SB237 Allows a person from another state to carry concealed if the Dept. of Public Safety has determined the requirements for a CCW permit are substantially similar or more stringent than Nevada’s requirements. This is subject to the approval of the Nevada Sheriff’s & Chiefs Association. The bill requires the Dept. of Public Safety to determine on or before July 1 each year which states are similar. For Nevada residents, as well as residents of others states, this bill creates 3 categories of firearms: revolvers, semi-automatics, or both. A CCW may be obtained in any of the three categories. (This is an improvement over current law, which requires approval on individual firearms.) It provides that out-of-staters with CCW’s are subject to the same legal restrictions & requirements as CCW permitees in Nevada. It requires that reciprocal states have an electronic database which identifies each individual who possesses a valid CCW in their state accessible at all times through a national law enforcement telecommunications system. Nevada has no reciprocity at this time. For those who want CCW’s, this is a good beginning. Eagle Forum has worked for years on getting reciprocity through the Nevada Legislature. Passed at last…passed at last!
AJR6 urges the US Congress to repeal the REAL ID Act. Numerous other states have passed similar resolutions, some much stronger than Nevada’s. This has forced Congress to extend the original May 2008 deadlines for implementation. The cost of implementation just for Nevada is $30 million for the first 2 years. Real ID Act of 2005, which passed Congress hidden in a funding bill for the Iraq War, is a mandate from the federal government to the States, which will require them to link their record keeping systems (driver’s licenses) to national databases. In other words, it is a National ID. Real ID will store every driver’s personal information and a photograph in a central database. The specter of a National Identity card, long antithetical to liberty loving Americans, is a windfall for identity thieves. Without REAL ID you will not be able to board an airplane, enter a federal building, collect Social Security or other benefits, open a bank account or have a job. Plans are also in the works to require REAL ID in order to be able to vote. In other words, without REAL ID you will become a “non-person”, unable to buy or sell…Passage of AJR6 was one of Eagle Forum’s top priorities this session.
SB42: Making Failure to Wear a Safety Belt a Primary Offense--Loses!
Passed Senate 11-10, Died in Assembly Transportation Committee.
SB42 Removes the current provision of existing law, which prohibits the issuance of a citation for failure to wear a safety belt in a motor vehicle unless you are stopped for some other offense. That means you can be stopped by a cop for not wearing your seat belt! In other words they can use that excuse to stop you at anytime for any reason. “Just checking to see if you had your seat belt on.” This has the appearance of police state. We were promised when the seat belt law was first adopted that this would never happen. Thank goodness this died!
Assembly 29-13, Died in Senate Judiciary Committee.
AJR5 would have amended the Nevada Constitution to authorize the Legislature to provide for a statewide lottery to provide money to school districts for textbooks, computers and other educational media for classrooms. Lotteries in other states have not improved education funding or educational performance. How many more families and particularly children will be harmed when more parents become addicted to gambling via the lottery. The majority of people participating in lotteries are those who can least afford it. Players with household income under $10,000 bet nearly three times as much as those with income over $50,000. Education reform is what we need, including real instruction in systematic intensive phonics, basic math, and school choice. These basic reforms will provide real educational improvement in our government schools than any amount of lottery money. It is relatively easy for children to gamble on a state sponsored lottery. In Massachusetts 47 percent of 7th graders have purchased a lotto ticket. Nationwide, more than 4 in 10 adolescents gamble on lotteries. Recent research suggests that the earlier a person begins to gamble, the more likely they are to become addicted to gambling. Thankfully it died in the Senate Judiciary Committee.
AJR10 is a resolution urging Congress not to reauthorize the “fast track” approval of international trade agreements, such as, NAFTA, CAFTA, GATT, and WTO. The results are lost sovereignty, lost jobs, lost manufacturing, outsourcing, and the tremendous US trade deficit, which threatens the US economy. National Eagle Forum President Phyllis Schlafly in her article, “Fast Track is Unconstitutional”, wrote, “Fast track violates our separation of powers, diminishes American sovereignty, and infringes on the rights of Americans to engage in the trade of our choice. “ Recently, Congress once again abdicated its responsibility and reauthorized Fast Track. For more info on Fast Track go to www.eagleforum.org
Nevada Families Eagle Forum Newsletter is published 12 times a year. The Subscription price is $25.00.
Legislative Report! & Illegal Immigration Alert!
Passed Senate 20-1 Maggie Carlton voting NO, Passed Assembly 42-0
SB92 originally repealed the gun registration ordinances in Las Vegas, North Las Vegas, Henderson, which were grand-fathered in when Nevada’s Concealed Carry Weapon law was originally passed in 1989. The original bill was opposed by the Las Vegas Metro Police and others. The bill now would provide a period of 60 days before it is required that a concealed carry firearm be registered for non-county residents. This would cover CCW permitees from other counties in Nevada or people coming in for gun shows, etc. from out of state. The definition of a gun “able to be concealed” is one with a barrel of less than 12 inches. The bill also provides for a period of at least 72 hours be allowed for county residents for the registration of a pistol upon the transfer of the title. We are sorry that the original bill was gutted and no longer provides for the repeal of gun registration in Clark County. However, we have succeeded on these issues incrementally—one legislative session at a time. This is a good step in the right direction.
SJR2 The Senate originally passed the bill with 16 in favor and 5 opposed. The Assembly Judiciary Committee originally failed to pass SJR2, so it died in Committee. However, after Senate Republican Majority leader Raggio’s arm twisting and who knows what else, SJR2 was revived, passed out of the Assembly Judiciary and passed the Assembly 30 to 11. It will now have to be voted on at the 2009 Legislature and then thankfully go on the ballot for a vote of the people. The Federal Imperial Judiciary are all unelected. They have brought us the decisions on the Ten Commandments, the Pledge of Allegiance and of course Roe v Wade. And don’t forget in Massachusettes the unelected judges forced same-sex marriage on the people and the Legislature, and in New Jersey they forced civil unions. We don’t want the Judiciary to be independent of the people! SJR2 creates a closed shop and secures the appointment of judges by the good old boys network. No one who challenges the Powers that Be will ever be approved by their Judicial Selection Commission. THANKYOU! NO votes in the Senate: Republican Senators Amodei, Beers, Cegavske, Heck, McGinness, & Democrat Schneider. THANKYOU! NO votes in the Assembly: Republican Assemblymen Beers, Carpenter, Mabey, Stewart, Weber, Democrats Anderson, Manendo, Oceguera, Ohrenschall, Parnell, Smith, & Christensen excused.
Passed Assembly 34-7, Failed in Senate Legislative Operations & Elections 4-3
More Legislative Issues will be covered next month including changes to Petitioning, Election and Eminent domain laws.